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Do you guys find neck of a knife an useful feature? From a maker stand point, the neck allows an easier transition from the geometry to the tang. From an user perspective (my own opinion), it affects negatively the grip (you have less grip on the handle with your last 3 fingers) and a handle can get in a way when doing tip work.

Here is an example. A large wa knife, 250-260mm will have a 5.75-6" long handle. A typical neck lengh is about .75". so you have about 6.5-6.75" distance from knife's heel to the handle's end. If you are to use a tip of a knife with a typical profile (not considering flat profiled knives here), you have to raise the handle end accordingly, and it might get in a way of a grip.

The obvious solution would be to shorten the neck lengh to about 5-6 mm, make the transition between a handle and a blade smooth, so changing grips from handle grip to pinch grip depending on cuts is effortless. This way there will be more of the handle is the hand even if one pinch-grips the blade, and the handle wouldn't need to be as long as a typical wa handle for that size of the blade, so one won't need to raise the end as high for tip work.

It might as well be just a personal preference. For instance, an octagonal handle never did anything for me (though I made a few of them), while the modified D was just what I was looking for in a Wa handle. Even with a pinch grip, I prefer less space between a handle and a heel, and more sizable part of the handle in my hand (or the last three fingers).

I am going to make a few knives, including a nakiri with hybrid D (short neck) and Western handles and see how they are received and what feedback/suggestions I get. This is a new project so it will take some time before I settle on a final design.

Marko

PS: I take by "exposed machi" you mean no space between machi and handle.